September 5, 2025 • 22 mins
The Biggest Loser promised dramatic transformations, but behind the scenes it relied on punishing calorie deficits, grueling exercise, and public shaming, leaving most contestants regaining all the weight and more. In this episode of the Supra Human Podcast, Ben Olliver, Dr. Taylor Waters, and Ryan Stevens reveal why the show’s approach was never sustainable and contrast it with healthier models like MrBeast’s weight loss challenge, where individualized coaching, empathy, and long-term strategies created lasting results. They break down why extreme methods fail, how identity and behavior change drive real transformation, and what the fitness industry must do to move beyond quick fixes.
Chapters
(00:00) Introduction
(01:21) Why The Biggest Loser Looked Inspiring on the Surface
(03:05) The Reality of Weight Regain After the Show
(04:59) Extreme and Dangerous Training Tactics
(07:52) The Complete Lack of Aftercare and Support
(09:56) Why Behavior and Identity Change Matter More Than Willpower
(13:38) The Problem With Quick Fix Fitness
(17:50) MrBeast’s Challenge: A Better Model for Sustainable Weight Loss
Do you think shows like The Biggest Loser help or harm the way people view fitness and weight loss? Drop your thoughts in the comments, we want to hear your perspective.
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Interested in joining the team? We are always looking for high performers to join our mission to achieve elite level performance in fitness, nutrition and mindset. View our current career opportunities: https://www.suprahuman.com/careers
Results may vary depending on your condition, starting weight, and commitment to the program.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
From what I remember on the documentary, they made their
contestants burn 4000 calories aday.
The. Show wasn't called Let's help
these people lose loads of weight and then keep it off for
the rest of their life so they live a long and.
Fulfilling life. Now compare this biggest loser
to Mr. Beast's video where Tylerwas the coach.
We. Always say there's a loads of
coaches out there, you can take your pick, but how many good
quality coaches are out? There are you the next biggest
(00:22):
loser? I'm Ryan Stevens.
Doctor Taylor Waters, I'm Ben Oliver.
Welcome to the Superhuman show, Yeah?
Are you the next Biggest loser or just another fat wanker?
Welcome to the superhuman show. So I recently watched the
Biggest loser documentary on Netflix and it was it was kind
(00:42):
of like a behind the scenes where I interviewed a load of
contestants probably from like 10 years ago.
And I loved the show when it, when it started and the, the
transformations were insane. It wasn't like, oh, you know,
Dave lost 50 lbs. It's like Sheila lost £800 in
(01:02):
this, in this show. And it's obviously when I was
watching it, it's, it's a it's ATV show.
And so you get a very condensed version in 30 minutes of kind of
like their week. And you know, there's, there's
some gym stuff. There's like a bit of them
eating their struggles, their personal stories, you know, and
then they have the big, you know, at the end of each week
(01:24):
they step on the scale and then on the screen it shows the, the
weight loss. And if they, it's, it's teams.
And so whoever loses the most weight, you know, and then they
get eliminated if they, they getvoted off by the, the trainers.
And it was like a, it was a genius move for a, for a show.
But do you? Know when I first started
(01:44):
watching the the documentary, obviously I, I had seen it in
the past, but like I hadn't paidmuch attention to it.
So the documentary was the firsttime I really started to delve
into it. And I initially when I was
watched it, I was like, it's is in general, not a bad idea.
Like people find it motivationalto see people given this
lifeline work hard, drop all this weight, and it's a bit of
(02:08):
like a success story. It's just, again, when there's
money and or like the fame that it got that's on the line,
people go really extreme and that's when it goes S But the
general concept of it, I was like, yeah, it sounds pretty
good. Like when you want to try and
maximise views on ATV Show, you have to remember it's for
entertainment. Yeah, that's the most important
thing. To there, there was a bit of
(02:28):
mugging. Going on, I can tell you it
wouldn't have been a documentaryif if it was like, done
properly. So we, because we, we, we've,
we've spoken about it in terms of motivation.
You've got internal and externaland stuff.
And so there's big prize money for when they win and you know,
they'll, again, it's a show. So they're like, well, like, why
are you here? Like I'm doing it for my kids
and it's like you're doing it for 100100K probably.
Should we forget the 100K there?Oh, no, no, no, no.
(02:50):
No, I still want that the kids can fuck off.
But so, so but the the the interesting part of the
documentary is because it was itwas behind the scenes and a
couple of the people that they interviewed that had been on the
show have not only regained the weight after, but more so.
And that was a really, really frequent occurrence over the
years. Like I'm sure you could find it
(03:11):
online, but it was like 50 to 60% of them would, they would
all gain some weight back, but like 50 to 60% would go right
back to the, to the start. And so we, we talk about this
where we say, you know, weight loss isn't the problem.
It's weight maintenance because yo-yo, dieting has been around
for decades and decades. People will will drop 20 lbs,
gain 20 lbs, drop 20 lbs, gain 20 lbs Well.
(03:33):
What's the sayings that people have?
And it's like they like people who claim that diets don't work.
And then the statistics that arelike, because weight regain is
like 80%, yeah, 80% people who lose weight only go on to gain
it sometimes more in the future.It's it's over 80.
And again, these these stats arebeing pulled from all angles
(03:53):
but. Generally your ass mainly.
Yeah, mainly my ass. Yeah, but it's it's over 80%.
Whenever they do report them sometimes like as high as 95%.
And it's like, and this is again, this is where some of it
comes from. It's like, look at all the stuff
on TV. All these people just went on to
regain that weight. Yeah.
And so the with with the show they they really did.
(04:16):
I mean, we talked about the two the two things that you really
use is activity and calorie reduction.
You have to create a calorie deficit to lose weight.
It's. Funny because none of them on
the show were talking about likewhole hormones.
Gut gut. I didn't hear anyone talk about
gut microbiome. We're going to lose the most of
white, the most amount of weightthat we can.
Let's test everyone's gut microbiome, No one said.
(04:38):
And funny enough, they were losing like 200.
Pounds you wouldn't want to be doing stool samples.
Give me a pickup truck. Give them all a bucket.
Pick it up with a shovel. But so, but what they did was
they, they took it to the extreme.
So calorie restriction was huge.You know these to get to 400
lbs, you're putting down 7 to 12,000 calories a day
(05:02):
consistently and then you're being put on a 1500 calorie diet
whilst doing more activity than you've probably done in the last
10 years in a week. And so they, they were doing,
you know, they were walking for hours and hours a day, which
already I'm like you're £400 Youshouldn't be walking that much.
You need. You need.
Stress fractures. Yeah, you need to slowly build
(05:24):
up to that. Then they were doing their
workouts multiple times a day and, you know, massively reduce
carbohydrate intake, you know, high, high protein diet, which
we all think is, is great, but nowhere near enough fuel to, to
kind of just allow them to do that activity.
And then and you'd see it on the, the scale drops.
(05:44):
And obviously if someone's £400,you know, they, the water flux
is that, that someone that big would get would be significant.
You know, your weight's going tofluctuate by two to 5% from
water day-to-day. When you're 400 lbs, you're
talking 20 LB fluxes, but they were dropping consistently, you
know, 10 plus pounds a week and and even when they were kind of
(06:08):
they're down 50 lbs a £100 stillgetting these epic drops, you're
talking. About The deficit is so heavy.
Like it's almost like a like a like a negative negative deficit
where it's like not only have you burn off all of the calories
that you consume that day, but like double that is so they
(06:28):
were, they were from what I remember on the documentary,
they they made their contestantsburn 4000 calories a day.
Now I don't know what measurement they used for
because we know exercise measurements of calorie burn is
way off. But even if I was trying to burn
4000 calories on a treadmill, that's so much for a long and it
(06:49):
was. It was insane.
But they weren't. Working or anything.
They were just like, they were big people and they would
exercise in most of the day. Yeah, like, so it's like I
wouldn't be surprised if they were.
Burning and they were, they werepassing out in the gym, you
know, and then and then again it's a show and the trainers
would be like get up 10 more andI'd be like get the ambulance
in. Here people are like I'm getting
(07:12):
dizzy, I got pains in my chest and they're like you're a pussy
mate. If having a heart attack is a
pussy then I'm probably 1 as. Well, I think that's a keyword.
You said they're extreme becauselike, obviously they lost loads
of weight, but was it realistic they were going to keep that up
after the show? The, and then so the, the, they
mentioned this in the documentary as well, but I mean,
I, I always thought this was, wetalk about a lot like the, the
(07:35):
reverse diet, the, the after, once you've hit the low weight,
what do you do then? And there was 0 aftercare in in
any of the seasons. You know, once once that last
big show is done, you're on yourown.
Once the cash, no. Once the check has been cashed,
that's it. It came over.
We don't, we don't. We don't need you anymore.
(07:56):
They were just. Cash cows, it's like.
Get them in. Let's let's entertain the world,
let's cash in on them once the cash is in, boom and.
That go on. The, the only thing you learn
from doing that is how you neverwant to do it again.
Yeah, You don't learn anything about fat loss, you know, 'cause
they've just, they've starved themselves and they walked all
there like, I don't want to do that and I don't know anything
else. And so they they naturally stop
(08:17):
doing both of those things and pack on fat like fast than ever.
I can guarantee every single oneof those, they were thinking
about the end point to go back to all they did previously
because they did it that much, you know, and obviously with us
talking about like the aftercare, like we always say,
like the fat loss phase is the end of the beginning.
And I know you then build the reverse diet into the fat loss,
don't you? You know, you're like
(08:38):
transitioning their calories up to I.
I see. The end when, when they kind of
hit that low weight, that's yourhalfway point in your life
versus like we've, we've got there because just mentally it's
like, no, you're 50% there. So you're still switched on.
Yeah, I think, well when you think about what we do within
supra to facilitate long term behaviour change, like what are
the what are the the tactics we have in there?
(09:01):
Like improving knowledge and understanding is one of them.
Skill development is another one.
Changing identity is another one.
Like the, the community side of things is another one.
It's like we've got all these things that are going to improve
the client's ability to then manage this in the long term
(09:21):
from a psychological standpoint.And then you've obviously got
like the Africa, learning how toreverse diets, getting your
hunger levels back, back stable,making sure that they're making
food choices that are going to enable them to manage their
calories over time. And all these things that we put
in place, they do none of them. It's like I'm going to, it's an
external motive right up the gates.
(09:43):
Then the only reason they're doing things is because if they
don't do them, they get punished.
Then when the show's over, the punishment stops, so they're not
going to continue doing them anymore.
It's it's, it's all, it's extreme weight loss, all geared
around short. And again, external motives can
be powerful short term, but if you do have intentions on having
long term success, there has to be other things put in place for
(10:06):
when that external motive is then removed to then continue
making progress moving forward. And that that was just none of
that. It's just like, let's just
hammer it as hard as we can. Well, of course.
It's almost like if you thought they were going to keep that way
off, you're delusional. Yeah, absolutely delusional.
Totally unrealistic expectations, the I.
Mean the other thing as well as they all did the same trading
routine. Yeah or every single one of
(10:27):
them. They might have had pre-existing
injuries, anything like that. They they all do in the same
circuits, the same the same amount of steps, despite how
much they weighed, their experience, their age, all of
this stuff. And they all just did the same
bullshit. Yeah and it like obviously it
worked because you do enough dumb shit, it's still work yeah,
of course, but there was no personal I I bet they all
(10:47):
followed the same time, which just.
It's so calorie restricted that even the person there with the
slowest metabolism would still lose a shit load of weight.
The the the question with the show is not what works.
Like we understand what works, but it's the the thing that were
questioned is the approach that was taken.
But then again, when you think about the aims of the show, it
(11:08):
was the biggest loser who can lose the most amount of weight
in a short in in the time periodthat they had available to them.
The show wasn't called Let's help these people lose loads of
weight and then keep it off for the rest of their life so they
live a long and fulfilling life.It's just called the Biggest
Loser. It wouldn't have made TV if that
was the, if that was the. Play on words of just like the
biggest loser. Like I know what you mean.
You mean the person who lost themost of my the most amount of
(11:31):
weight, hence biggest loser. But then you're also mugging
them off on national TV, hence the biggest loser.
Even just that alone is like, ohgosh.
Yeah, and then I know they've because the show continued for,
you know, I I think like Steve Cook was one of the yeah, he was
one of the but I, I think like, I mean, I'm, I'm sure, I mean, I
think he only did one season andhe probably looked at it and
(11:52):
goes, I don't want to be a part of this.
And and apparently he did a verygood job.
But I think they probably get told kind of what they have to
do and what they have to make people do.
And any any coach that has some morals.
And so I'm not a huge fan of Gillian Michaels and Bob Harper
because they went on this is. The poo woman and she.
The what the poo? Woman.
(12:14):
Who's that? Gillian Michaels, is that it?
Oh, no, sorry. What are you on?
About. I'm on about Gillian Mckeith.
Do you remember it? Because she was like a like a
diet pace. Yeah.
Examine the poo. Yeah, yeah.
OK, forget that. Jay and Michael she had been
picking it up by the shovel at the biggest.
Level must have been so confusedwhen I went the Pooh were my.
(12:34):
Friends like what? The hell have you been watching?
Yeah, but like, I'm not, I'm nota huge fan of them because they
went along with it. Yeah.
And I and I, you know, everyone has a price, but like that
reputation of like where you, you went along with it and, and
despite what they say be like, no, you know, we told them to do
this. We don't.
You fucking didn't like you got a fat paycheck.
You know, you were on the biggest loser for 10 to 15
(12:56):
years, making millions from it. And you were a celebrity trainer
because it, it, it kind of shot their careers into the
stratosphere as now they're the sought after celebrity trainer
because you know, you got, you know, Dave to drop 200 lbs in
six months. And it's like, Dave's dead now,
like. And so it's didn't really like
that. No, The thing is with those
(13:18):
would even question whether thattype of trainer even knew how
bad it was what they were doing.We always say there's loads of
coaches out there. You can take your pick.
But how many good quality coaches are out there are pretty
slim. And they're just, they're
probably, you know, they're trainers who they get their
clients in their celebrity clients and they just like
(13:38):
hammer them with a circuit threetimes week and tell them to eat
salads. And like, there's no thought
about like, OK, how can I teach this person?
There's none of that. It's just, well, of they just
know the basics of if you hammersomeone from a fitness
standpoint, you starve them somewhat, they're going to lose
weight. So then when they went into
this, I bet they were like, yeah, this is this is just quite
an extreme version of what I do now.
But they never thought about thethe consequences of that type of
(14:01):
act. You know, it's really funny,
like the whole celebrity trainerkind of area.
Like there's some like Aaron Williamson, awesome, awesome
guy, awesome trainer. The guy that trains Chris
Hemsworth pretty switched on Aussie guy.
There's probably a there's another one which Tyler knew, I
can't remember his name, but he trained Ryan Reynolds for
(14:23):
Deadpool and it has done so. He has very, very switched on
with his training and awesome guy.
But I think a lot of them are kind of like it was right place,
right time when you knew the right person, because then you
look at, you know, the, the, theactor or whatever will post kind
of the workouts that they did. And, and it's always fluffed up.
You know, it's like, oh, he gained 40 lbs for this role and
(14:43):
he's like, I was eating 6000 calories.
It's fucking work. Like, and, and any coach with a
with a brain wouldn't have done that.
But it like, it seems like they just lucked out.
And then it's like, Oh, the the most highly sought after trader
in Hollywood. And I'm just like.
Why? But you can tell even I think
one of the one of the coaches. So who was who was the guy?
(15:04):
The man's name? The man.
PT Bob Harper. I think it was him who was
chatting on the show and immediately he was talking and I
was like, well, he's clearly rubbish.
Like he's clearly a moron. He's just, he's a, he's not a
celebrity trainer as in he, it'slike he's a celebrity because he
is a trainer and also is a celebrity.
Like he's just, he's in the crowd of celebrities and he's a
(15:26):
personal trainer. It doesn't like mean he had to
go through qualifications and experience to get to the
celebrity trainer. He just is a trainer, pretty
crap trainer and he's a celebrity do.
You know, like the clients have obviously gained all the weight
back. Now, what they don't realize the
impact that has had, OK, is thattheir last experience of trying
to drop body fat was that that extreme approach Like it's going
(15:48):
to make it so much different. PTSD.
The negative associations they will have with like diet, fat
loss and it's going to make it so much harder for them to lose
weight and keep it off in a sustainable way.
So well the last time I tried I was, I don't know doing I
haven't watched the show but doing 6 training sessions a week
trying to burn 4000 calories. And we we get it a lot when the
clients sign up to super up and they'll say, oh, well, my last
(16:09):
trainer, you know, wasn't a great experience.
And, you know, they had me doingthis.
They never doing that. I didn't make any progress.
And you're kind of like, where did you find this guy?
It's so calm. And it's so you almost, you
almost want to like, like you'd be like, I apologise on behalf
of coaches that that person is acoach.
Yeah. And it's I would.
Say this happens in mass with and again, you can't paint
(16:31):
everyone with the same brush, but you see it all the time.
Now in fitness with like the bodybuilders who coach Genpop is
they use the tactics of a bodybuilding prep with Genpop
clients who have a different goal.
So they they might call it. What do they call it?
They obviously they call that bodybuilding clients, lifestyle
(16:53):
clients. But you use the same tactic.
You don't know anything outside of a bodybuilding prep, so you
just use a bodybuilding prep with someone who's not.
Bodybuilding. The only difference is they
don't get as lean. Yeah, that's it.
The difference with lifestyle and body, it's like they don't
step on stage. Because they're not as motivated
as the bodybuilder is. Because he signed up to a show
and he hasn't. But it's like, but you use the
same tactic for them and again, it's a short term tactic.
(17:15):
The hence why bodybuilders don'tlook like that year round
because it was a short term tactic to get the desired look
by a desired date. But then you give that to
someone else who wants to have long term success and build this
physique long term and it doesn't work.
They get it, they do a photo shoot and then six months later
they're back to custard guts andit's like here we go, here we go
(17:36):
again and it's straight back in the mix.
So I think the now compare this like Biggest Loser to Mr.
Beast's video where Tyler was the coach and it was still a
weight loss challenge and I think he had he had 12 months to
lose 100 lbs. Was it 6 or was it I think he?
(17:57):
Did change. So the goal was 12.
I think he did it in eight or nine, I think, Yeah.
But you know, big prize money, big external motivator, it was
kind of like, you know, lots of money went into it.
It's like you can't leave the the circle of the gym.
And so he's kind of stuck there on his own.
And, and Tyler was the trainer for it.
And the approach that they took was exactly how we would do it
(18:17):
because Tyler is a fantastic coach.
He was a fantastic coach. And so, you know, the guy was
doing 12 to 15,000 steps, started off on some basic
training, you know, using machines because he wasn't very
experienced with the free weights.
And then it was all very, very progressive.
And the guy has kept the weight off and he looks better now than
when he finished the Yeah, because obviously he he posts
(18:38):
more on social media and stuff down and he looks in better
shape now than when he finished it.
And it just goes to show it he, he was set up for success.
Yeah, because the whole way he did it, it wasn't overly
aggressive. It was based on his needs, his
his body type, what he likes to eat, what he doesn't like to
eat, what he likes to train, what he doesn't like to train.
All of that was taken into to consideration to build his plan.
(19:01):
And then you had the support of Tyler as a human being talking
about lifestyle changes, behavior changes, identity
change, all of this stuff. And so, you know, there's really
no way that he wasn't going to lose the weight because it was
just set out perfectly. So.
The foundations of that are really similar, but the tactics
that went in, one of them was geared around long term, one of
(19:21):
them geared around purely short.Term Well, the trainers on that
celebrity show would call the client like a pussy if he fell
on the floor. What was the first thing Tyler
said to the client? And the client said that's what
like really made him like Tyler.Tyler said.
It's so cool that we get to do this together.
Like instantly trying to build arelationship.
You know, I can't imagine a great relationship come from
calling someone a pussy on the floor.
(19:41):
Whatever, I think they got pains.
In that chest. Literally, if if so, if I was
going to, if someone said like, well, how would you do Biggest
Loser differently? I'd go watch that YouTube video.
That's exactly how I'd do it. And so that that was that's,
that is, that is exactly how I'dhave approached it.
And still losing over £100 in eight months, still in amazing.
And the guy, the guy was big, but he wasn't the like, you
(20:04):
know, he wasn't 400 lbs and so. Yeah, I, I just thought it was
an interesting documentary because it it was a bit
nostalgic watching it because it, it kind of disappeared off
TV for a while, but yeah. They never got back to you when
you applied, did they? No, no, they said I was too fat
and so they're like this. The scale was not.
Big What was the prize money? Just out of curiosity, I think.
(20:25):
It was like 250 grand or something.
I'll have to look. So it was it was a decent
amount. So it was obviously an external
motivator there as well. But the fact he's kept it off,
obviously that for the Mr. Beast.
Yeah, the Mr. Beast. I think it was like, for every
pound lost, it was like. You've got a grand, I think it
was. More than that.
Oh, was it? Yeah.
He ended up with a few hundred, a few 100 grand I think.
So obviously he would have had that paycheck now, right?
(20:46):
But he still kept it off. So obviously his internal
motivation now just goes to showhow good Tyler was.
Well, teacher was like Tyler waslike teaching him about his
diet, wasn't it? Tyler was there, you know, he
was supporting him throughout itand like they were talking about
like his father. So Tyler was talking about, so
the last time this the last timethis guy tried to lose weight,
his father passed and that ruined it.
(21:07):
And then he ended up going back.So like Tyler's learning about
these previous experiences that he's had to try and guide him
and support him, not just like trying to punish him into weight
loss. So yeah, I, I highly recommend
if you're going to apply for TheBiggest Loser, don't sign up for
Superhuman. But thank you as always for
(21:28):
tuning in. Be sure to like and subscribe
and we'll see you next time if. You love this show.
Please like, share and leave us a five star review so that we
can help more people. I'm John Mattson in case go get
what's yours.
From what I remember on the documentary, they made their
contestants burn 4000 calories aday.
The. Show wasn't called Let's help
these people lose loads of weight and then keep it off for
the rest of their life so they live a long and.
Fulfilling life. Now compare this biggest loser
to Mr. Beast's video where Tylerwas the coach.
We. Always say there's a loads of
coaches out there, you can take your pick, but how many good
quality coaches are out? There are you the next biggest
(00:22):
loser? I'm Ryan Stevens.
Doctor Taylor Waters, I'm Ben Oliver.
Welcome to the Superhuman show, Yeah?
Are you the next Biggest loser or just another fat wanker?
Welcome to the superhuman show. So I recently watched the
Biggest loser documentary on Netflix and it was it was kind
(00:42):
of like a behind the scenes where I interviewed a load of
contestants probably from like 10 years ago.
And I loved the show when it, when it started and the, the
transformations were insane. It wasn't like, oh, you know,
Dave lost 50 lbs. It's like Sheila lost £800 in
(01:02):
this, in this show. And it's obviously when I was
watching it, it's, it's a it's ATV show.
And so you get a very condensed version in 30 minutes of kind of
like their week. And you know, there's, there's
some gym stuff. There's like a bit of them
eating their struggles, their personal stories, you know, and
then they have the big, you know, at the end of each week
(01:24):
they step on the scale and then on the screen it shows the, the
weight loss. And if they, it's, it's teams.
And so whoever loses the most weight, you know, and then they
get eliminated if they, they getvoted off by the, the trainers.
And it was like a, it was a genius move for a, for a show.
But do you? Know when I first started
(01:44):
watching the the documentary, obviously I, I had seen it in
the past, but like I hadn't paidmuch attention to it.
So the documentary was the firsttime I really started to delve
into it. And I initially when I was
watched it, I was like, it's is in general, not a bad idea.
Like people find it motivationalto see people given this
lifeline work hard, drop all this weight, and it's a bit of
(02:08):
like a success story. It's just, again, when there's
money and or like the fame that it got that's on the line,
people go really extreme and that's when it goes S But the
general concept of it, I was like, yeah, it sounds pretty
good. Like when you want to try and
maximise views on ATV Show, you have to remember it's for
entertainment. Yeah, that's the most important
thing. To there, there was a bit of
(02:28):
mugging. Going on, I can tell you it
wouldn't have been a documentaryif if it was like, done
properly. So we, because we, we, we've,
we've spoken about it in terms of motivation.
You've got internal and externaland stuff.
And so there's big prize money for when they win and you know,
they'll, again, it's a show. So they're like, well, like, why
are you here? Like I'm doing it for my kids
and it's like you're doing it for 100100K probably.
Should we forget the 100K there?Oh, no, no, no, no.
(02:50):
No, I still want that the kids can fuck off.
But so, so but the the the interesting part of the
documentary is because it was itwas behind the scenes and a
couple of the people that they interviewed that had been on the
show have not only regained the weight after, but more so.
And that was a really, really frequent occurrence over the
years. Like I'm sure you could find it
(03:11):
online, but it was like 50 to 60% of them would, they would
all gain some weight back, but like 50 to 60% would go right
back to the, to the start. And so we, we talk about this
where we say, you know, weight loss isn't the problem.
It's weight maintenance because yo-yo, dieting has been around
for decades and decades. People will will drop 20 lbs,
gain 20 lbs, drop 20 lbs, gain 20 lbs Well.
(03:33):
What's the sayings that people have?
And it's like they like people who claim that diets don't work.
And then the statistics that arelike, because weight regain is
like 80%, yeah, 80% people who lose weight only go on to gain
it sometimes more in the future.It's it's over 80.
And again, these these stats arebeing pulled from all angles
(03:53):
but. Generally your ass mainly.
Yeah, mainly my ass. Yeah, but it's it's over 80%.
Whenever they do report them sometimes like as high as 95%.
And it's like, and this is again, this is where some of it
comes from. It's like, look at all the stuff
on TV. All these people just went on to
regain that weight. Yeah.
And so the with with the show they they really did.
(04:16):
I mean, we talked about the two the two things that you really
use is activity and calorie reduction.
You have to create a calorie deficit to lose weight.
It's. Funny because none of them on
the show were talking about likewhole hormones.
Gut gut. I didn't hear anyone talk about
gut microbiome. We're going to lose the most of
white, the most amount of weightthat we can.
Let's test everyone's gut microbiome, No one said.
(04:38):
And funny enough, they were losing like 200.
Pounds you wouldn't want to be doing stool samples.
Give me a pickup truck. Give them all a bucket.
Pick it up with a shovel. But so, but what they did was
they, they took it to the extreme.
So calorie restriction was huge.You know these to get to 400
lbs, you're putting down 7 to 12,000 calories a day
(05:02):
consistently and then you're being put on a 1500 calorie diet
whilst doing more activity than you've probably done in the last
10 years in a week. And so they, they were doing,
you know, they were walking for hours and hours a day, which
already I'm like you're £400 Youshouldn't be walking that much.
You need. You need.
Stress fractures. Yeah, you need to slowly build
(05:24):
up to that. Then they were doing their
workouts multiple times a day and, you know, massively reduce
carbohydrate intake, you know, high, high protein diet, which
we all think is, is great, but nowhere near enough fuel to, to
kind of just allow them to do that activity.
And then and you'd see it on the, the scale drops.
(05:44):
And obviously if someone's £400,you know, they, the water flux
is that, that someone that big would get would be significant.
You know, your weight's going tofluctuate by two to 5% from
water day-to-day. When you're 400 lbs, you're
talking 20 LB fluxes, but they were dropping consistently, you
know, 10 plus pounds a week and and even when they were kind of
(06:08):
they're down 50 lbs a £100 stillgetting these epic drops, you're
talking. About The deficit is so heavy.
Like it's almost like a like a like a negative negative deficit
where it's like not only have you burn off all of the calories
that you consume that day, but like double that is so they
(06:28):
were, they were from what I remember on the documentary,
they they made their contestantsburn 4000 calories a day.
Now I don't know what measurement they used for
because we know exercise measurements of calorie burn is
way off. But even if I was trying to burn
4000 calories on a treadmill, that's so much for a long and it
(06:49):
was. It was insane.
But they weren't. Working or anything.
They were just like, they were big people and they would
exercise in most of the day. Yeah, like, so it's like I
wouldn't be surprised if they were.
Burning and they were, they werepassing out in the gym, you
know, and then and then again it's a show and the trainers
would be like get up 10 more andI'd be like get the ambulance
in. Here people are like I'm getting
(07:12):
dizzy, I got pains in my chest and they're like you're a pussy
mate. If having a heart attack is a
pussy then I'm probably 1 as. Well, I think that's a keyword.
You said they're extreme becauselike, obviously they lost loads
of weight, but was it realistic they were going to keep that up
after the show? The, and then so the, the, they
mentioned this in the documentary as well, but I mean,
I, I always thought this was, wetalk about a lot like the, the
(07:35):
reverse diet, the, the after, once you've hit the low weight,
what do you do then? And there was 0 aftercare in in
any of the seasons. You know, once once that last
big show is done, you're on yourown.
Once the cash, no. Once the check has been cashed,
that's it. It came over.
We don't, we don't. We don't need you anymore.
(07:56):
They were just. Cash cows, it's like.
Get them in. Let's let's entertain the world,
let's cash in on them once the cash is in, boom and.
That go on. The, the only thing you learn
from doing that is how you neverwant to do it again.
Yeah, You don't learn anything about fat loss, you know, 'cause
they've just, they've starved themselves and they walked all
there like, I don't want to do that and I don't know anything
else. And so they they naturally stop
(08:17):
doing both of those things and pack on fat like fast than ever.
I can guarantee every single oneof those, they were thinking
about the end point to go back to all they did previously
because they did it that much, you know, and obviously with us
talking about like the aftercare, like we always say,
like the fat loss phase is the end of the beginning.
And I know you then build the reverse diet into the fat loss,
don't you? You know, you're like
(08:38):
transitioning their calories up to I.
I see. The end when, when they kind of
hit that low weight, that's yourhalfway point in your life
versus like we've, we've got there because just mentally it's
like, no, you're 50% there. So you're still switched on.
Yeah, I think, well when you think about what we do within
supra to facilitate long term behaviour change, like what are
the what are the the tactics we have in there?
(09:01):
Like improving knowledge and understanding is one of them.
Skill development is another one.
Changing identity is another one.
Like the, the community side of things is another one.
It's like we've got all these things that are going to improve
the client's ability to then manage this in the long term
(09:21):
from a psychological standpoint.And then you've obviously got
like the Africa, learning how toreverse diets, getting your
hunger levels back, back stable,making sure that they're making
food choices that are going to enable them to manage their
calories over time. And all these things that we put
in place, they do none of them. It's like I'm going to, it's an
external motive right up the gates.
(09:43):
Then the only reason they're doing things is because if they
don't do them, they get punished.
Then when the show's over, the punishment stops, so they're not
going to continue doing them anymore.
It's it's, it's all, it's extreme weight loss, all geared
around short. And again, external motives can
be powerful short term, but if you do have intentions on having
long term success, there has to be other things put in place for
(10:06):
when that external motive is then removed to then continue
making progress moving forward. And that that was just none of
that. It's just like, let's just
hammer it as hard as we can. Well, of course.
It's almost like if you thought they were going to keep that way
off, you're delusional. Yeah, absolutely delusional.
Totally unrealistic expectations, the I.
Mean the other thing as well as they all did the same trading
routine. Yeah or every single one of
(10:27):
them. They might have had pre-existing
injuries, anything like that. They they all do in the same
circuits, the same the same amount of steps, despite how
much they weighed, their experience, their age, all of
this stuff. And they all just did the same
bullshit. Yeah and it like obviously it
worked because you do enough dumb shit, it's still work yeah,
of course, but there was no personal I I bet they all
(10:47):
followed the same time, which just.
It's so calorie restricted that even the person there with the
slowest metabolism would still lose a shit load of weight.
The the the question with the show is not what works.
Like we understand what works, but it's the the thing that were
questioned is the approach that was taken.
But then again, when you think about the aims of the show, it
(11:08):
was the biggest loser who can lose the most amount of weight
in a short in in the time periodthat they had available to them.
The show wasn't called Let's help these people lose loads of
weight and then keep it off for the rest of their life so they
live a long and fulfilling life.It's just called the Biggest
Loser. It wouldn't have made TV if that
was the, if that was the. Play on words of just like the
biggest loser. Like I know what you mean.
You mean the person who lost themost of my the most amount of
(11:31):
weight, hence biggest loser. But then you're also mugging
them off on national TV, hence the biggest loser.
Even just that alone is like, ohgosh.
Yeah, and then I know they've because the show continued for,
you know, I I think like Steve Cook was one of the yeah, he was
one of the but I, I think like, I mean, I'm, I'm sure, I mean, I
think he only did one season andhe probably looked at it and
(11:52):
goes, I don't want to be a part of this.
And and apparently he did a verygood job.
But I think they probably get told kind of what they have to
do and what they have to make people do.
And any any coach that has some morals.
And so I'm not a huge fan of Gillian Michaels and Bob Harper
because they went on this is. The poo woman and she.
The what the poo? Woman.
(12:14):
Who's that? Gillian Michaels, is that it?
Oh, no, sorry. What are you on?
About. I'm on about Gillian Mckeith.
Do you remember it? Because she was like a like a
diet pace. Yeah.
Examine the poo. Yeah, yeah.
OK, forget that. Jay and Michael she had been
picking it up by the shovel at the biggest.
Level must have been so confusedwhen I went the Pooh were my.
(12:34):
Friends like what? The hell have you been watching?
Yeah, but like, I'm not, I'm nota huge fan of them because they
went along with it. Yeah.
And I and I, you know, everyone has a price, but like that
reputation of like where you, you went along with it and, and
despite what they say be like, no, you know, we told them to do
this. We don't.
You fucking didn't like you got a fat paycheck.
You know, you were on the biggest loser for 10 to 15
(12:56):
years, making millions from it. And you were a celebrity trainer
because it, it, it kind of shot their careers into the
stratosphere as now they're the sought after celebrity trainer
because you know, you got, you know, Dave to drop 200 lbs in
six months. And it's like, Dave's dead now,
like. And so it's didn't really like
that. No, The thing is with those
(13:18):
would even question whether thattype of trainer even knew how
bad it was what they were doing.We always say there's loads of
coaches out there. You can take your pick.
But how many good quality coaches are out there are pretty
slim. And they're just, they're
probably, you know, they're trainers who they get their
clients in their celebrity clients and they just like
(13:38):
hammer them with a circuit threetimes week and tell them to eat
salads. And like, there's no thought
about like, OK, how can I teach this person?
There's none of that. It's just, well, of they just
know the basics of if you hammersomeone from a fitness
standpoint, you starve them somewhat, they're going to lose
weight. So then when they went into
this, I bet they were like, yeah, this is this is just quite
an extreme version of what I do now.
But they never thought about thethe consequences of that type of
(14:01):
act. You know, it's really funny,
like the whole celebrity trainerkind of area.
Like there's some like Aaron Williamson, awesome, awesome
guy, awesome trainer. The guy that trains Chris
Hemsworth pretty switched on Aussie guy.
There's probably a there's another one which Tyler knew, I
can't remember his name, but he trained Ryan Reynolds for
(14:23):
Deadpool and it has done so. He has very, very switched on
with his training and awesome guy.
But I think a lot of them are kind of like it was right place,
right time when you knew the right person, because then you
look at, you know, the, the, theactor or whatever will post kind
of the workouts that they did. And, and it's always fluffed up.
You know, it's like, oh, he gained 40 lbs for this role and
(14:43):
he's like, I was eating 6000 calories.
It's fucking work. Like, and, and any coach with a
with a brain wouldn't have done that.
But it like, it seems like they just lucked out.
And then it's like, Oh, the the most highly sought after trader
in Hollywood. And I'm just like.
Why? But you can tell even I think
one of the one of the coaches. So who was who was the guy?
(15:04):
The man's name? The man.
PT Bob Harper. I think it was him who was
chatting on the show and immediately he was talking and I
was like, well, he's clearly rubbish.
Like he's clearly a moron. He's just, he's a, he's not a
celebrity trainer as in he, it'slike he's a celebrity because he
is a trainer and also is a celebrity.
Like he's just, he's in the crowd of celebrities and he's a
(15:26):
personal trainer. It doesn't like mean he had to
go through qualifications and experience to get to the
celebrity trainer. He just is a trainer, pretty
crap trainer and he's a celebrity do.
You know, like the clients have obviously gained all the weight
back. Now, what they don't realize the
impact that has had, OK, is thattheir last experience of trying
to drop body fat was that that extreme approach Like it's going
(15:48):
to make it so much different. PTSD.
The negative associations they will have with like diet, fat
loss and it's going to make it so much harder for them to lose
weight and keep it off in a sustainable way.
So well the last time I tried I was, I don't know doing I
haven't watched the show but doing 6 training sessions a week
trying to burn 4000 calories. And we we get it a lot when the
clients sign up to super up and they'll say, oh, well, my last
(16:09):
trainer, you know, wasn't a great experience.
And, you know, they had me doingthis.
They never doing that. I didn't make any progress.
And you're kind of like, where did you find this guy?
It's so calm. And it's so you almost, you
almost want to like, like you'd be like, I apologise on behalf
of coaches that that person is acoach.
Yeah. And it's I would.
Say this happens in mass with and again, you can't paint
(16:31):
everyone with the same brush, but you see it all the time.
Now in fitness with like the bodybuilders who coach Genpop is
they use the tactics of a bodybuilding prep with Genpop
clients who have a different goal.
So they they might call it. What do they call it?
They obviously they call that bodybuilding clients, lifestyle
(16:53):
clients. But you use the same tactic.
You don't know anything outside of a bodybuilding prep, so you
just use a bodybuilding prep with someone who's not.
Bodybuilding. The only difference is they
don't get as lean. Yeah, that's it.
The difference with lifestyle and body, it's like they don't
step on stage. Because they're not as motivated
as the bodybuilder is. Because he signed up to a show
and he hasn't. But it's like, but you use the
same tactic for them and again, it's a short term tactic.
(17:15):
The hence why bodybuilders don'tlook like that year round
because it was a short term tactic to get the desired look
by a desired date. But then you give that to
someone else who wants to have long term success and build this
physique long term and it doesn't work.
They get it, they do a photo shoot and then six months later
they're back to custard guts andit's like here we go, here we go
(17:36):
again and it's straight back in the mix.
So I think the now compare this like Biggest Loser to Mr.
Beast's video where Tyler was the coach and it was still a
weight loss challenge and I think he had he had 12 months to
lose 100 lbs. Was it 6 or was it I think he?
(17:57):
Did change. So the goal was 12.
I think he did it in eight or nine, I think, Yeah.
But you know, big prize money, big external motivator, it was
kind of like, you know, lots of money went into it.
It's like you can't leave the the circle of the gym.
And so he's kind of stuck there on his own.
And, and Tyler was the trainer for it.
And the approach that they took was exactly how we would do it
(18:17):
because Tyler is a fantastic coach.
He was a fantastic coach. And so, you know, the guy was
doing 12 to 15,000 steps, started off on some basic
training, you know, using machines because he wasn't very
experienced with the free weights.
And then it was all very, very progressive.
And the guy has kept the weight off and he looks better now than
when he finished the Yeah, because obviously he he posts
(18:38):
more on social media and stuff down and he looks in better
shape now than when he finished it.
And it just goes to show it he, he was set up for success.
Yeah, because the whole way he did it, it wasn't overly
aggressive. It was based on his needs, his
his body type, what he likes to eat, what he doesn't like to
eat, what he likes to train, what he doesn't like to train.
All of that was taken into to consideration to build his plan.
(19:01):
And then you had the support of Tyler as a human being talking
about lifestyle changes, behavior changes, identity
change, all of this stuff. And so, you know, there's really
no way that he wasn't going to lose the weight because it was
just set out perfectly. So.
The foundations of that are really similar, but the tactics
that went in, one of them was geared around long term, one of
(19:21):
them geared around purely short.Term Well, the trainers on that
celebrity show would call the client like a pussy if he fell
on the floor. What was the first thing Tyler
said to the client? And the client said that's what
like really made him like Tyler.Tyler said.
It's so cool that we get to do this together.
Like instantly trying to build arelationship.
You know, I can't imagine a great relationship come from
calling someone a pussy on the floor.
(19:41):
Whatever, I think they got pains.
In that chest. Literally, if if so, if I was
going to, if someone said like, well, how would you do Biggest
Loser differently? I'd go watch that YouTube video.
That's exactly how I'd do it. And so that that was that's,
that is, that is exactly how I'dhave approached it.
And still losing over £100 in eight months, still in amazing.
And the guy, the guy was big, but he wasn't the like, you
(20:04):
know, he wasn't 400 lbs and so. Yeah, I, I just thought it was
an interesting documentary because it it was a bit
nostalgic watching it because it, it kind of disappeared off
TV for a while, but yeah. They never got back to you when
you applied, did they? No, no, they said I was too fat
and so they're like this. The scale was not.
Big What was the prize money? Just out of curiosity, I think.
(20:25):
It was like 250 grand or something.
I'll have to look. So it was it was a decent
amount. So it was obviously an external
motivator there as well. But the fact he's kept it off,
obviously that for the Mr. Beast.
Yeah, the Mr. Beast. I think it was like, for every
pound lost, it was like. You've got a grand, I think it
was. More than that.
Oh, was it? Yeah.
He ended up with a few hundred, a few 100 grand I think.
So obviously he would have had that paycheck now, right?
(20:46):
But he still kept it off. So obviously his internal
motivation now just goes to showhow good Tyler was.
Well, teacher was like Tyler waslike teaching him about his
diet, wasn't it? Tyler was there, you know, he
was supporting him throughout itand like they were talking about
like his father. So Tyler was talking about, so
the last time this the last timethis guy tried to lose weight,
his father passed and that ruined it.
(21:07):
And then he ended up going back.So like Tyler's learning about
these previous experiences that he's had to try and guide him
and support him, not just like trying to punish him into weight
loss. So yeah, I, I highly recommend
if you're going to apply for TheBiggest Loser, don't sign up for
Superhuman. But thank you as always for
(21:28):
tuning in. Be sure to like and subscribe
and we'll see you next time if. You love this show.
Please like, share and leave us a five star review so that we
can help more people. I'm John Mattson in case go get
what's yours.
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